Flashfire
by Shadow over Egypt
Summary: Mello was a star in more ways than one, and he knew it, and everyone else had to know it too. With L, he was going to change the world. L promised. #oneshot, for 'Kari#


**Shadow:** For Hikari – happy Christmas.

_**Notes: **_Side-story to _Ashes to Ashes, _though you don't need to read that to understand this.

* * *

**Flashfire**

_The boy's blue eyes stared at the carnage around them, his small mouth thin and solemn, unable to find the words to aptly describe what was going on inside the matching small head._

_A pale, larger hand touched him lightly on the shoulder, gentle as a spidertouch. "Do you believe in birthdays?"_

_Recently turned seven year-old Mihael Keehl looked up, into dark, dark pools of black. "Not really," he admitted quietly, using the English he'd been addressed in, "I only care for special ones."_

"_Was this one special?"_

"_No." A pause, the younger of the two thinking over his options for a few moments. "…I want a present though. From you."_

"_Oh?" L Lawliet, seventeen years of age and greatly intrigued by a child ten years his junior, knelt down amidst the ashes and muck of what had once been Mihael Keehl's orphanage. "What is it that you want?" The boy knew of his identity – Mihael knew L had the power to grant him practically anything under the sun._

"_I want," Mello said; very calm, very seriously, his gold, blond hair glimmering in the winter sun, "you to help me change the world."_

_So L did._

* * *

"_Matt!" _

It was a familiar shriek that echoed through the Wammy's House orphanage early one Saturday morning, a loud volume and oscillating pitch depending on the fury of the source, and whether said source had been accused of sounding too much like a girl in the past week or so.

"_Matt, I'm going to _kill _you! Where are you?!"_

Yes, indeed, a familiar shriek, and a familiar sight to the sleepy inhabitants of the orphanage when they poked their heads around the doors of their respective rooms to see a delicate package of blond, eight year-old vehemence stalking down the corridors outside with an unholy glint of bloody murder in bright blue eyes (with extra emphasis on the 'bloody').

The shriek and the stalking…that was normal, a regular weekend occurrence. The inhabitants of Wammy's placed bets on what time their Saturday morning wake-up shriek would be, hoards of sweets awarded to the triumphant winner. What _wasn't _as regular, however, was said stalker's hairstyle, because –

"_Matt!" _Mello stopped, furious, before one unfortunate gawker, fixing the poor boy (two years his elder) with a death-glare-above-all-death-glares. "Have _you _seen him?!"

"N-noo -"

"_Matt!" _And Mello was off again, pace even more enraged than before, pretty blond pigtails (done up in pink pom-pom bobbles for extra added effect) on either side of his head bouncing up and down with each glorious stomp.

And the one he had just verbally assaulted stood dumbly behind, mouth doing an incredible impression of a goldfish, whilst watchers of the scene came and patted him consolingly on the back and muttered (very, _very _quietly) behind their hands:

"Is he _supposed _to look like Baby Spice…?"

…

When Mello finally found Matt, the red-head was, rather wisely, hiding under a table. It was to no avail however, Mello having been pointed in the right direction by some other poor soul fearing for their life, immortal soul and the future of the Spice Girls, and the blond was not to be deterred from The Course of True Justice.

"Mello." Matt managed a rather weak smile when his best friend grabbed him with a scary strength by the collar, yanking him out from under the table to look at glaring Death in the eyes. "I was just looking for you-"

"Under the table?" Mello was an exceedingly pissy prepubescent that morning, having woken up with his hair in bunches, and high heels upon his feet. Pink, _sparkly _high heels. (He'd taken _those _nightmares off before he'd went on his hell-bent mission to murder.)

"Well, the dust-bunnies down there are really quite informative -"

"Matt!" Mello shook him. "_Look at my hair!"_

"It's…very nice?"

"_What did you do to my hair?!"_

"I – um." Matt wilted a little under his friend's glare. "It's not my fault you have girly hair?"

"I do _not _have girly hair!!" Mello's grip tightened on the other's shirt to the point where Matt started seeing very pretty blue stars twirl in front of his eyes.

"Boys don't usually moult on the furniture -"

"Maaa-_aaattt!" _The Irish boy was being shaken back and forwards like a stripy rag-doll at that point, making some funny choking noises from his throat. (Matt was _'special' – _had he been anyone else, he would've been dead by that point in time.) "I do _not _like heels and I do _not _have girly hair!!" And then, as an afterthought, Mello having heard at least three comments passed behind his back as he'd stormed on his merry way that morning – "And I do _not_ look like that blonde bimbo from the Spice Girls!" (He was going to go back and slowly slaughter every misguided idiot who had ever dared to even _think _such a blasphemous idea.)

Matt was beginning to turn some very interesting colours from lack of oxygen when someone finally intruded upon Mello's session of revenge-n-shake, one of the tutors of the orphanage letting out what sounded like a mild scream and dashing forward to liberate the younger boy from the blond's grip.

"Mello, you're killing him!!"

And as Mello put it later himself, when sitting waiting for a scolding about the whole affair in Rodger's office, arms folded sulkily across his chest, "That was the entire _point."_

* * *

Mihael Keehl, to L, always had, and always would be, a child of fire. The little orphan, all clothed in blood-smeared and ash-streaked white, had been plucked from the ruins of the explosions in Russia, clinging both to L's side and life with a stubborn vivaciousness that defied everything fate chose to throw in the blond's path. Mello would go and do only what it was _he _decided he would go and do, driving the chariot of flame across the skies so everyone was forced to admire him, the eternal star of his self-made stage.

"L!" Mello cried out when he saw his mentor at the end of the corridor in front of him, having seen there was no-one else around. To nigh everyone else save for the first generation of children L was called D, but to Mello – ah, to Mello – _"L!"_

L smiled that lopsided grin of his when the nine year-old powered towards him, having learned from past experience to widen his stance and open his arms to the incoming missile unless he wanted to end up flat on his back on the floor.

Mello clung to him like a black-clad limpet; arms tight around the detective's neck, face snuggled into the elder male's shoulder. "_L."_

"Mello," L returned, trying to support the boy's weight with one arm, the other pale hand pressed against the child's head, "you've put on weight." L's tactful way of saying: 'Mello, you weigh like a ton of bricks. _Shift.'_

"Ah, sorry -" Mello slowly slid down, clutching at the black-haired youth's hand instead, "I didn't know you were coming home."

"Nor did I," the other admitted, "until a few days ago. A case brought me to England."

"Really?" Mello perked up further. "Can you tell me about it?"

"_No," _said L rather emphatically.

His little companion wasn't to be dissuaded. "Can…you tell me about another case instead?"

"Mello -"

"_Please?" _Small children were lethal when they learned even the slightest sense of manners to go alongside generally adorable looks.

"Mello, I have people I need to go talk to -"

"Talk to them later." Mello pulled out a pout, well aware of how that usually got him off the hook for whatever scrape he'd recently ran into. "Talk to _me _now. You _never _talk to _me, _L. Don't you love me? _Llll…"_

L decided to try and be firm. "Mello, your manipulation is utterly wasted on me -"

"_L!" _

The detective gave in with a sigh. "Very well." Mello promptly set about trying to crush his already quite skinny waist from the force of his hug. "But this has absolutely nothing to do with you, and everything to do with the fact the people I am due to talk to do not require my presence at this moment in time -" Mello's 'yeah, _right' _expression spoke tenfold of the demonic thoughts within his head, "-brat."

"Like you can speak?"

Mello was perfectly content to trail along holding L's hand, beaming when the teenager led them to a quiet, small library in the institute where rarely anyone went. There, L took up a seat beside the window, switching the lamp on the desk beside his chair to dispel the gloom of the gathering evening. When the detective tried to draw his knees up to his chest in his usual crouch Mello reached up and pulled the limbs back down, resting his head on the elder's lap, as L's slim fingers automatically went to trail through the shimmering sea of gold pooled over his thighs.

And L talked. Mello listened raptly – when L was in the mood he could tell a wonderful story; the black-haired male never forgot even the slightest detail, adding colour and life to the vivid imagery he conjured up with his words.

It was night proper when L's recount drew to a close, the detective sliding from the events of the past to the events of the future, speaking of a recent mishap his young charge had gotten involved in around Wammy's that Rodger has mentioned to him.

"If you come back to the House more often," Mello replied promptly, clinging to the other's legs, "I swear I'll try harder to be good."

"Mon ange d'ors," L said dryly, petting the other's golden mane. "Such blackmail."

"Huh?" Mello looked up at his idol, clueless, having not yet studied French. "L, what does that mean?"

"Never mind, Mello." The detective gently brushed the question aside. "Now – perhaps Mello should leave and head for the kitchens? It is growing very late, and if you want hot food to eat tonight…"

"I'll go." The boy rose to his feet, heading for the exit. "But you _will _be staying here for a little while, won't you L? For a few days at least?" When L nodded Mello smiled, near bouncing out of the room.

The _click _of the lock had barely sounded when someone grabbed the child by the neck, and slammed him into the wall.

Mello let out a low cry of pain, head slamming hard into the plaster, glaring with all the hate he could pour into his young expression into red-tinged dark eyes. "You -"

"Hush." Everyone knew the resident loony-case of the institute, the Wammy House's resident bogeyman who'd gobble up children too young and too stupid not to know to be back in their beds by the time it grew dark. Everyone _knew _B wasn't hinged quite right in the head, but still the teenager was brilliant – utterly, scarily brilliant – and L still let the other roam so –

"Let go of me!" Mello's angry response was little more than a hiss, not having enough air drawn into his chest to achieve anything louder.

It greatly disturbed Mello when the older male touched the blond's cheek, cupping the skin there and looking at the child with a kind of cold fondness. B looked a lot like L – _too _much like L – and to see such an expression on _L's _face sent a sick shudder down Mello's spine.

B's words were a whisper, more a note to himself than a comment to his captive. "I can't see what he likes so much in _you…__"_

Mello bristled like a cat, raising a hand from where he'd been trying to free B's hands from around his throat, and attempted to use said limb to gouge out the older boy's eyes with his nails. "Let – let _go!"_

B scowled, forcing the other's hand down, tightening his grip further so Mello actually _choked, _couldn't take in any air and started to panic, was actually _terrified _because B didn't look like Mello did when he was playing with Matt, no, not at all. B looked deeply serious and sickly fascinated by the cold coil of his fingers around Mello's throat and Mello couldn't breathe and oh God _he wasn't letting go –_

"B!"

L's voice, L's cry of surprise and anger and that was An. _Order._

B released his hold immediately, and Mello slid to the floor, coughing, wheezing, trying to draw breath into his oxygen-starved lungs.

"What did you think you were doing?!" L looked horribly intimidating standing there, the light from the room behind him stretching a long, dark shadow across the floor. There was a note of panic in the detective's voice – that shouldn't be there, but who was there to scold?

The lamplight glittered in B's eyes, and Mello didn't like that gleam, not at all, not one bit. "L…" the teenager's voice was soft, low and loving like you would be to an old, old friend –

"I asked you what you think you were doing."

There were so many confusing undercurrents between the two, Mello noted, love and dislike, adoration and hate, all swirled up together in a pretty, bloody little box with a horribly messy bow.

"He was getting in the way," B said pleadingly, ignoring the coughing child beside them on the floor.

"And do you assault _all _your competition?" L asked coldly, ignoring in turn B's flinch, the hot colour rising in his look-alike's cheeks.

"L -"

"Never mind." L strode forwards, helping Mello to his feet and taking the boy's hand. "Just get out of my sight. I'll talk to you later."

"L!"

L ignored him, walking off, nearly dragging Mello along beside him. They left B behind and Mello could feel the hot, hateful eyes on his back all the way down his corridor, the foul itch between his spine that marked B's gaze, but Mello didn't dare look back to see, just to check –

You didn't look back at the devil if you'd just escaped from him with your life.

* * *

Mello hated Near. It was a well-accepted fact within the Wammy's House, Mello unable to _stand_ the one person that was above him in rank. That the younger boy could be so calm in the face of Mello's fury only incited the blond even further, Matt often being forced to step in so that his best friend wouldn't end up committing first-degree murder before he even turned ten. All pretensions of Mello being 'sweet' or 'angel-like' flew out of the window with their misguided wings when Mello and Near met –

Unstoppable force? Please meet immoveable object.

And yet…there was restraint. Sometimes. Vaguely. The two boys could work in bristling silence beside one another for hours at an end; as long as both of them kept their mouths shut the violence was kept to a wonderful minimum. The law of karma, therefore, dictated that if something was going well between those two then something had to go drastically wrong somewhere else.

'A' committed suicide. Mello didn't know the youth from the first generation well, had only caught glimpses of the fairly quiet teenager with hair darker than L's, brown eyes that were soft and warm and smiled at you when his lips didn't move.

Mello clutched at L's hand at the graveside, cold and dreading and rooted to the spot for some reason he couldn't quite name. L didn't comment on it, let Mello cling to him, and the blond boy tried to ignore the fact that Matt was looking at him wistfully from elsewhere in the crowd, that other children were looking at him curiously and that B hadn't come outside, was watching the funeral from an upstairs window of the orphanage with that itchy, irritating gaze.

Mello held all the more tightly onto L's hand. "When I die, will I be nameless too?"

"Possibly. Probably." The detective's words were harsh, but his voice – "It depends what you go on to do."

"…How will God recognise me?"

L paused, seemingly genuinely surprised by the question. "…You believe in God, Mello?"

The ten year-old nodded. "I have a rosary in my room…" It had been his mother's. "It's a little too big for me right now, but as soon as it fits I'll wear it."

L looked down at A's grave – he seemed uncomfortable. "Are you baptised?" Mello nodded. "Made your Communion?" Another nod. "Confirmation?" A shake. "Would you like to?"

"Please." Little more than a whisper.

"I'll see it's arranged."

L saw to it, and Quillsh Wammy walked Mello up the aisle to the priest, L, Matt and a few other children watching from the pews. When asked what name he would wish to choose for himself Mello motioned the priest's head down, whispering softly, oh so softly, 'Aidan', in the man's ear. L and Wammy had thought it an apt choice for the fiery boy.

Mello wore his mother's rosary from then on in.

* * *

Matt couldn't believe it the day Near actually went out into the playground at break-time with a minimal amount of coaxing. The little albino boy winced a little as he sat in the bright sun, and everyone wondered just what little alien had come and replaced the ghost they all knew and were accustomed to.

And then Near fell over, tripping over the leg of his pyjama bottoms, and scraped his knee. Everyone blinked in surprise at the blossoming red showing on the boy's fabric, (the boy was _human?) _Near himself staring at the scratch rather blankly – and then everyone nearly _died _when Mello went over, helped the boy to his feet, and then hoisted the smaller child up into his arms and carried him, bridal style, when it became apparent Near's leg stung too much to walk.

"Wha – what -" Matt could only stutter as he hastily trailed Mello's footsteps, unable, like the rest of the playground, to tear his eyes away from the apocalyptic combination of black and white marching resolutely into the orphanage before them all. "Mello, what are you _doing?"_

The world was ending. They _knew _it.

Mello's jaw was clenched. "Shut up, Matt."

"But _Mello-!"_

Near, eyes blacker than oil, looked over the blond's shoulder at the bewildered red-head. "There is an extraordinarily high possibility that Mello is embarrassed at this present moment in time -"

"And _you _can shut up as well!" Mello snarled, and Near – for once deciding that would be the wiser course of action considering the other boy was carrying him – closed his mouth.

Later on, after Near had been dropped off to see the nurse and Mello sat sulking on his bed, Matt approached him, a little tentative.

"…Are you alright?"

"Never better," was the rather sour response.

"Everything okay in that head of yours?"

Blue eyes _glared _at him, Mello slipping back to his native tongue in temper. "Пойдите проползите в отверстие и умрите!"

Matt stared at the other blankly – Russian wasn't his forte. "…I have absolutely no idea what you just said to me, but it sounded painful."

Mello threw a pillow at him, rather viciously, and Matt took that as his cue to leave.

* * *

At twelve, Mello was forced into the beginnings of a conclusion that his and Matt's traditional hiding-spot, their nest at the bottom of Matt's rather spacious wardrobe, was getting a little too small for them. They'd been hiding in there ever since they were seven, stacking the place full of cushions and chocolate and games so that when copious amounts of children (and not a few adults) were baying for their blood after some prank or other, they had somewhere safe to run to and stay in for a few hours.

But, five years later, with five years of growth behind them all, the hiding-space was…strange. One day Mello was suddenly very painfully aware of how big he and Matt both were in comparison to the small place they hid in. How they fit awkwardly in a tangle of arms and legs, clothes and claustrophobia, unable to shift even slightly without smacking into another warm limb or the hard wall. And how, when there _was _a collision, his breath caught and his grip faltered, and just how terribly _green _Matt's eyes were, catching the light from his gaming console and shimmering in the black. Lucky Irish green, Matt-green, special.

Mello slipped once, when trying to manoeuvre into a comfortable seat. Slipped, and staggered, and ended up pressed far too close to his best friend than propriety would generally allow, and his chest _hurt _then, such lack of air, and fire needed to air to breathe but Matt, silly Matt, never noticed, too caught up in his game.

"Matt?" Mello's hand was pressed flat against the wardrobe wall beside the other boy's head, his voice a little hushed – but that could be passed off as not wanting anyone going by to hear them.

"Hm?" His companion paused his game, looking up and – oh, such _green –_

"…My – my hair -"

"What about it?"

"Um -" Mello floundered, "it's bugging me." The traditional answer between them. "Do you have a slide on you?"

Matt rolled his eyes as if to say of _course _he had a slide; he _always _had a slide because Mello had girly hair and was forever getting it everywhere, and he should really start carrying around a full brush and comb set alongside a hairdryer – "Here." He pulled two thin metal pins from the end of his shirt cuff, trying to offer them to Mello but only smacking into the blond.

There wasn't room for Mello to take them. "Could you put them in for me?" Matt sighed, but obliged, and Mello felt the other touch his cheek with soft fingertips in the semi-darkness, feeling their way to his hairline to tuck back golden strands with the slides. Matt was so close then, even when the job was done and he sat back a little his eyes were still trained on Mello, and the elder boy saw the other's most-familiar expression and pulled a face. "I do _not _have girly hair."

* * *

Mello loved arms practice. He had a soft spot for the many forms of hand-to-hand combat as well as swordplay, but when someone gave him a gun or a grenade or –

He was too young, legally, to bear arms by British standards. Way, _way _too young. Wammy's, elitist that it was, ignored the rules completely and gave them to the underage to practice with anyway, although they were given duds and blanks for _years _and kept under special watch. (Mello, in particular, was given more watch than anyone else, and was searched three times before he left the practice room in case he tried to sneak something out to terrorise Near with.)

Mello found some solace in the creations of fire, the symbol of blood and death jolting and jarring inside his thoughts, plucking at memories and…they eased him, a little, somewhat. L understood him when he tried to explain it to him once, the detective defending Mello's right to undertake the arms training even when the institute's psychologist (who, needless to say, L didn't get along very well with) warned very strongly against it.

Mello was at practice when he learned one of the orphans had run away from the House, and he put down the pistol he'd been using and went to go see Matt, who undoubtedly would have been talking to L. (Because L was back, and Matt liked L almost as much as Mello did.)

"Who was it?" Mello asked his friend, curious. There was no need to specify just who they were talking about.

Matt shrugged a little helplessly. "D wouldn't say." Matt, not _quite _one of the special ones, called L D. Ah, well –

"Then it was B." Mello said assuredly, and left Matt to go back to practice.

Good riddance to exceedingly bad rubbish.

* * *

Mello was thirteen when he decided to clear up the mess at the bottom of his own wardrobe, locking the door to his bedroom and then tying his hair back in a messy bun before he set to work. The junk of a lifetime had accumulated at the base of the space where he kept his clothes: - chocolate-wrappers, broken clips, old magazines, dusty workbooks and a pair of pink, sparkly high heels.

Mello pulled the latter items out; vaguely consternated at the fact he'd forgotten to throw the things out with the rubbish, idly remembering that he'd once woken up wearing the monstrosities before flinging them somewhere, willy-nilly, to go and kill Matt. A little curious as to whether the things would still fit he tried them on – not startled to find they didn't, but amused (more than he would've liked to admit) that he could wear them regardless, as long as he didn't mind his heels hanging over the back a little way. They'd been way too big for his eight year-old self, and so now they were only a little too small for him when he was thirteen.

He tottered around in them for a few steps before catching sight of himself in his mirror, and was thereupon forced by the streak of vanity within him to strike a ridiculous pose and attempt to do some dance moves because once upon a time he'd looked like a _star_ –

"You always were one for the solo performances, weren't you?"

Mello stopped abruptly, mid-step, awkwardly balanced with his neck snapped to stare at the laconic figure in the doorway, lost somewhere between horror, embarrassment and confusion. On heels, he inevitably overbalanced, stumbling and being caught by familiar pale hands.

"L!" Mello stared, actually _aghast, _up at the form of his idol – and then he promptly looked past the detective, at the open door to his room. "I locked that door!"

"And I picked it." L's grin was as lopsided as ever, utterly uncaring of the technical criminal act he'd just commited, and Mello scowled at him. "Ah, ah, ah…" the man released his companion when Mello took a few steps backward, sulkily kicking off of his heels, "if the wind changes Mello's face will be stuck that way."

"That's ridiculous." The blond snorted, but his scowl eased up somewhat regardless. "Why are you here, anyway?"

"Is Mello not glad to see me?"

"I'd be gladder to see you if you hadn't just broken into my room," was the rather flat response.

L smiled vaguely at that, petting the teenager's head, grin returning once more when Mello batted the hand away. "I'm going to Japan for some time on a case…I don't know when I'll be back."

Mello looked confused. "…I thought you were working in Germany? Wouldn't it have been quicker to fly straight from Germany to Japan, and say your goodbyes over a weblink?"

"I didn't feel like it," was L's rather cryptic answer.

"…Alright." Mello wasn't going to ask – if L wanted something left vague, L would _keep _it left vague. "Are you – _L!" _The blond youth exclaimed the latter letter in surprise when his older companion actually moved forwards and took him in a loose hold again, a wonky, one-armed, painfully awkward hug. "L, what are you-?"

"Remember you promised me you'd be good, Mello?"

Pink stained the blond's cheeks. "That was five years ago!"

The detective's dark eyes were serious. "A promise is a promise."

"I thought you said it was blackmail…?"

"_Mello." _So much meaning in that one, stupid name, so much meaning that had a low, hard knot forming in the bottom of Mello's stomach.

Words rose in Mello's throat, syllables fighting and squabbling to be blurted out of the youth's mouth. "I'll make a new promise with you then. I'll be good," he seized L's shirt, deepening the hug and burying his face in the lanky man's chest, "as long as you promise to come back in time for my fifteenth birthday. Fifteen is special. You have to be here for my special birthday."

Gently, gently, L patted his head, hands as soft as a spidertouch, smoothing down the pretty mane of gold. "I promise."

* * *

Exactly one week before Mello turned fifteen, Rodger calmly informed Mello and Near their mentor was dead.

Mello went off the deep-end. He made such a contrast with Near, introverted Near, the albino drawing more into himself at the pronouncement of L's passing, Mello getting louder and angrier, raging against the world and fate and Kira.

He stormed out of Rodger's office like a firestorm, tears in his eyes, unmindful of Matt who chased after him, who called after him, his head too full of pain and hate and anger and thoughts – _oh, _such thoughts!

Mello was quicksilver, uncatchable, unknowable, a flashfire unleashed from nowhere that razed through the building in a scream of black-clad anguish. The glowing star that was blazing, blazing, a meteor screeching for the apex it could achieve only at the destruction of another. Mello, the fierce sun that would one day implode –

"_Mello!" _

Mello ignored Matt, ignored the other boy's tears, ignored _everyone _as he locked himself up in the arms practice room for a little while, just a little while, as he thought, and he remembered, and couldn't banish L's lopsided smile from his mind, the other's stupid hugs and stupid stories and annoying way of appearing when you least expected him to –

This was Mello's performance, his show. He was the star, the wonder, the marvel; he was the one who drew in the audience to come see his blaze. He was Mihael; he was Mello, and he kept firing and firing and _firing _his gun at the blank-faced targets until his rounds were long gone and only an empty _click _sounded when he pulled the trigger.

He left the Wammy's House that evening, and the world felt his golden, furious fire.

* * *

"_I'll kill anyone who gets in my way."_

* * *

**AN: **'Пойдите проползите в отверстие и умрите' – pretty much bad Russian for, 'go crawl into a hole and die'.


End file.
